Justice Patricia Ajoku of the Federal High Court sitting in Ibadan, the Oyo State capital, has ordered the remand of one Onifade Gideon Idowu in prison until a case of alleged fraud filed against him is decided.
The accused was arraigned by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Ibadan zonal office, on Wednesday, October 2, 2019, on a five-count charge bordering on forgery, fake representation, obtaining money under false pretence and internet-related offences.
He was said to have explored the internet, through series of fake representations, to illegally receive over N30 million (Thirty Million Naira) and other sums in foreign currencies from victims of his fraudulent activities across the world.
One of the charges reads: “That you Onifade Gideon Idowu (a.k.a Melina Seekng, Melina Shelly James) sometime between the year 2017-2019 at Ibadan, Oyo State, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable court took possession of the sum of N30,000,000 (Thirty Million Naira) paid into your account with UBA Bank Plc with account number – 2091840941 when you reasonably ought to have known that the said funds formed part of the proceeds of an unlawful activity of wit: fraud, and thereby committed an offence to section 15 (2)(d) of the MoneyLlaundering (Prohibition) Act, 2011 as amended and punishable under section 15 (3) of the same Act.”
Due to the not-guilty plea, counsel to the EFCC, Murtala Usman, prayed the court for trial date and order to remand the defendant in prison custody.
The judge granted the prayer as he adjourned the case to November 4, 2019 for trial, and ordered that Onifade be remanded in the Agodi prison.
Meanwhile, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, Makurdi zonal office, has arrested three suspects for conspiracy and obtaining money by false pretence to the tune of N7, 107, 540.00.The suspects- Adewuyi A. Adebayo,31; Osikoya K. Gboyega, 44 and Akintunde Ogunrinde, 47- were arrested on September 9, 2019 following intelligence about their activities.
They were arrested at different locations in Lagos State and transferred to Makurdi, Benue State, Mr. Wilson Uwujaren, the EFCC spokesman, said in a statement.
The petitioner alleged that on 18th of February, 2018, he noticed his MTN line had stopped working as no calls or messages came to his phone and the phone displayed a message saying, ‘invalid SIM card’.
He went to the MTN office to lodge a complaint but was told to apply for a welcome back SIM that was not successful as someone else had swapped his SIM card in Abia State.
He immediately contacted his account officer at FCMB to inform them of the development and to change his alert phone number to another line only to discover that transactions had occurred on his account without his consent.
The threshold limit for online transfers on his account had also been increased above five hundred thousand Naira and the sum of Seven million, one hundred and seven thousand, five hundred and forty Naira (N7,107,540.00) removed from his account.Further investigations revealed that the suspects masterminded the alleged the fraud.The suspects will soon be charged to court as soon as investigations are concluded.